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Tee Don Landry walks in the footsteps of his father, inventor of the Zydeco rubboard

Video: Tee Don Landry explains, demonstrates the rubboard, or Cajun 'Frottoir'At Lafayette's Festival International, Tee Don Landry explains and demonstrates the rubboard, or Cajun Frottoir. Landry said his father designed the first rubboard for Cleveland Chenier, brother of Zydeco accordionist, Clifton Chenier. Landry follows in his father's footsteps as a designer, and has recently created a female-shaped washboard for pop star Rihanna.

Most of us just generically call it a washboard, but Tee Don
Landry said his instrument is called a rubboard, or in Cajun French, a "Frottoir."
It looks almost like a breast plate. A piece of armour. When rubbed up and
down, this panel of corrugated steel makes a sound that is characteristically
Cajun and Zydeco.

The rubboard provides the rhythms not only for the music of
south Louisiana, but is increasingly being found in other genres. As someone
who makes the instruments for some of the world's most prominent
musicians, Landry can tell you how his boards are showing up in some unexpected
places, such as on tour with Rihanna.

"I designed the women's boards for her," he said, pointing to a unique rubboard with an hourglass shape. It was invented specifically
for the pop singer.

"Her agency, Def Jam Records, called me. I made 12 of
them and they used them on the tour. They sent me a video of the concert,
showing dancers wearing them," Landry said.

He's following in his father's footsteps as a modifier of
this instrument that is synonymous with south Louisiana's Cajun and Zydeco
culture.

Landry said the rubboard was invented in 1946 by his father,
Willie Landry, while in Port Arthur, Tx. In those days, he said, there
were as many Cajuns living in Port Arthur as there were in Lafayette. The elder
Landry made the rubboard in coordination with Grammy Award-winning accordionist Clifton Chenier. The instrument was first used by his brother, Cleveland Chenier.

It's not that the idea was completely new; people had made
sounds with washboards for as far back as they had been around. But what Willie's
father did, the innovation that turned the scraping of steel from music made on
a washing tool to music made on an instrument, was the creation of a shape that
allowed for easier use: the rounded top that hooks over the shoulders.

Today, Tee Don Landry sells rubboards to a variety of
notables. Most recently, he sold one to Kid Rock. There was also Billy Gibbons
of ZZ Top, who posed for a photo with Landry; he keeps it on display in his
booth in the art vendor section at Festival International. He's made boards for
Elvin Bishop, Lyle Lovett, the Neville Brothers, and "too many more to mention."

Landry has been selling his rubboards at Festival
International for the past six years. Do performers at the
fest ever stop by?

"I have some musicians who come by and look at some stuff,
or buy some stuff," said Landry, who seems to have a constant stream of
visitors curious to take their first stab at an instrument they'd always
wondered about.